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Posted on 05/15/2011 5:23:47 AM PDT by Kaslin
As governor of Alaska, Sarah Palin "demonstrated many of the qualities we expect in our best leaders," The Atlantic's Joshua Green reports in a must-read story. "She set aside private concerns for the greater good, forgoing a focus on social issues to confront the great problem plaguing Alaska, its corrupt oil-and-gas politics. She did this in a way that seems wildly out of character today -- by cooperating with Democrats and moderate Republicans to raise taxes on Big Business. "
After making the case, Green then asks, "What happened to Sarah Palin?"
And: "How did a popular, reformist governor beloved by Democrats come to embody right-wing resentment?"
Green concludes that the qualities that helped Palin battle entrenched Republicans "weren't nearly so admirable when deployed against less worthy foes." (That is, don't pee on the Democrats.) He also noted Palin's tendency to over-personalize everything. Yet Green could not help but wonder what might have happened if Palin -- somehow as a running mate -- had been able to steer Sen. John McCain's presidential campaign to take on Wall Street.
I have a different take.
Like Green, I see serious flaws in Palin's makeup. Start with a failure to do her homework. But I believe the media feeding frenzy that followed McCain's selection of Palin as his running mate distorted her as a human being in a fundamental way.
When McCain picked Palin, his campaign team thought the media would hail Palin as a fellow maverick, a moderate who could work with Democrats and avoided polarizing social issues by, for example, vetoing a bill banning benefits for same-sex spouses of state workers. That is, Camp McCain expected the sort of in-depth look that Green provided in "The Tragedy of Sarah Palin."
They also thought that personal profiles would portray Palin as a pro-life Republican who walked the walk when she chose to give birth to a son with Down syndrome.
Alas and woe to her, Palin had the misfortune of walking onto the national stage in the era of the blogosphere. A Daily Kos blogger charged that Palin faked giving birth to Trig five months earlier in order to conceal her teenage daughter Bristol's pregnancy. Other bloggers, as well as British and Australian newspapers, joined the pile-on. That rumor was put to rest for all but the most ardent Palin "birthers" when Bristol turned out to be five months pregnant.
While most reputable American news outlets did not report the rumors, The Washington Post's Howard Kurtz wrote at the time that reporters deluged the campaign with questions "about the governor's amniotic fluid, the timing of her contractions and whether she would take a DNA test to establish the baby's parentage." Those questions enraged the McCainiacs.
Palin's record as governor also went through the dirt washer. Palin wrote in her memoir "Going Rogue," "Suddenly I was a book-burning evangelical extremist sweeping down from the North on her broomstick." Factcheck.org felt compelled to report that Palin "did not demand that books be banned from the Wasilla library" and "has not pushed for teaching creationism in Alaska's schools."
Green laments that McCain/Palin didn't run "as mavericks," but instead "turned hard right." He doesn't seem to understand that the political press corps kept seizing unsubstantiated odd-bin tidbits to paint Palin as a right-wing kook and social-issues crusader -- and thus shoved Palin into the right-wing ghetto.
If a Republican cannot get credit for being a moderate, she might as well rush into the warm embrace of the GOP base. Like John McCain.
I do not absolve Palin for her post-campaign excesses. A stronger woman may well have withstood the barrage and -- after returning home and tending to state business -- emerged as a seasoned survivor. Instead, she resigned as governor to cash in on her role as the Republican whom lefties most love to hate.
That's on Palin. But when the media wonder what went wrong with her, they might start by looking in the mirror.
I was going to post a barf alert, but when I read the last sentence I decided against it
A stronger woman may well have withstood the barrage
Just stupid.
“How did a popular, reformist governor beloved by Democrats come to embody right-wing resentment?”
Oh, that’s easy.
She became a threat to the Democrat power base.
The lib MSM saw her, and recognized immediately she might be another Reagan. Plus she was a member of one of their victim groups (women - no one from a victim group is allowed to become a powerful conservative) and she dared to have a defective child.
I noticed the real hate came after Trig. That’s not happenstance.
Disclaimer: Debra J. Saunders is a Romney sycophant and lives openly as an idiot in California. She is also ugly to the bone.
She was such a tremendous threat they felt compelled to destroy her.
Click to learn more about her...
Elect Sarah Palin for President 2012
Re-Elect President Sarah Palin 2016
When you're right you're right, sad isn't.
They are afraid of her
I love Palin. I have already donated to Palin and will do so again if she runs. I will work for her and vote for her.
But (and here’s where I put a target on my back), I now believe it was a mistake that she resigned.
Although her resignation was correct on its merits (the reasons she gave were right and true), and although that resignation gave her a lot of power to influence events in the 2010 elections, I now believe that the resignation is a liability going into the 2012 election.
If she had stood and held her ground against the barrage of assaults against her in Alaska, five things would have resulted:
1. It would have been undeniably worse for the people of Alaska. I understand that.
2. She would have had much less (maybe even no) influence on the 2010 elections.
3. She would have received financial support for her legal bills from millions of us across America.
4. In her fight against the outlandish assaults against her by the Obama-organized Alaskan leftists, she would have prevailed and made them look bad and herself look infinitely stronger.
5. She would be in a much stronger position right now as a possible candidate for president.
It is absolutely crucial for FReepers to understand that the left didn’t just start going after Palin in 2008. Note that I said the left, and not Democrats. They have been after her since 2006, when she defeated Knowles for governor.
She has scared the crap out of them for going on 5 years.
One of Knowles’ media people were none other than Anita Dunn. Yes...THAT Anita Dunn. Much of that leftist infrastructure remained and remains in place to attack Palin. That said, they have played all their cards. There is nothing left for them to expose. The only thing we do not know at this point is how often members of the Palin family go to the bathroom each day.
They are now simply hoping that years of attack have turned off enough people on both the left & the right. Hence their constant refrain that she is unelectable. This is “projection.”
Don’t be fooled.
Those candidates that the press fail to attack at this stage, are those that they are hiding the dirt about...and they will save it until after the primary. It will be a complete repeat of what they did with McCain in 2008.
Palin is the ONLY candidate the MSM has completely vetted. Keep that in mind.
Deb Saunders is an idiot who has lived in the Bay area too long.
She ran a nice smear campaign against Meg Whitman and helped get Moonbeam elected and she works for the hard left SF Chronicle .
No, every contribution would have triggered yet another bogus charge and investigation.
The article states she did but nobody has contested it.
Palin resigned as AK guv because she believed it was in the best interest of the state. She was right.
Keep this in mind:
Daniels divorce records, so far private. Think they’ll stay that way?
Bachmann has 25 foster kids. No one has investigate her foster kids or even her own natural kids. Think it will stay that way?
Romney was NEVER vetted in 2008, as he was never the frontrunner. You think they’ll ignore his business dealings in 2012, if he’s the nominee?
I could go on, but I suspect you guys get the picture. They are going easy on the Anybody But Palin crowd.
Like the Kloppenburg Supreme Court race in Wisconsin, they think they have “enough.” They are assuming they have damaged Palin enough, while holding back information on other candidates that will kill their candicacy.
To release at a time of their choosing.
She resigned as Governor because the personal lawsuits and harassment was a significant negative to the work of the State.
Resign or stay on, the WH would not permit success for Sarah
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